Tuesday, 11 May 2010

After some quite beautiful words on the nature of human relationships from Kou, episode six of Arakawa Under the Bridge gets back to some serious business - Namely, the Eurovision song contest that is the musical competition between Ric and Star.

While Star looks to have won the day with his wonderfully penned song about girls haircuts, Ric's violin playing abilities prove to be sufficiently mind-blowing for him to take the plaudits... until it turns out to be a little too mind-blowing for Star, whose subsequent breakdown and performance of "The Howling of a Loser" makes him an under-bridge sensation.

With the contest out of the way, Ric busies himself with looking for work, trying to figure out what product he could sell to the residents under the bridge, before becoming quite rightly distracted by the appearance of Nino in a swimsuit. The purpose of this is to teach the Brothers how to swim, something which Nino attempts in a rather... "unique" style before Ric suggests a more traditional lesson which proves equally fruitless on account of the small matter of the two boys wearing huge godamn metal helmets. Still buoyed by his relative success and the suggestions of others, Ric begins to contemplate the thought of becoming a teacher to the residents under the bridge, which of course he mulls over with his own ulterior motives in mind...

While nothing was going to top the epic hilarity of P-ko's banana incident last episode, this instalment certainly had its moments, from Star's music abilities (surely a place on Britain's Got Talent is in his future?) through to the young Brothers attempts to swim. That aside, Kou's behaviour continues to swing from disdain for his fellow residents through to rather enjoying their company, while Nino seems ever more in awe of Ric's abilities by the episode - Something which he doesn't seem to have grasped entirely despite his efforts to impress her. This episode didn't really hold quite as much depth as previous instalments, but it was no less enjoyable for it, and this series continues to entertain with its uniquely quirky situational comedy.

I enjoyed the subtlety of the moment with the girl and her mother - I was expecting the woman to make an outright comment about how all the people living there are crazy, but instead her fears were left up to us to imagine.

Of course, both of Star's songs are absolutely fantastic. I hope he's going to get a character single released in Japan at some point. :p